Mannering has a bad game and has been below par. I am not sure it’s at the point where he is hurting us
I’m not sure how else to put it. In just about every game this year he has fallen off crucial tackles or made tragic defensive reads that have deadset cost us tries. Last night he had two awful efforts in two tries before halftime. They were crucial tries. As bad as we played, if Mannering makes those plays which he has always made in his career, if Fus grounds the cross field kick, and Satae holds the ball as he’s about to go over the halftime score line is reversed.
That kind of sums things up for me. Both RTS and Lawton in the second half came within a pube of scoring, but Souths kept turning up. Then they just rolled us with ease through the middle. But we bombed two clear tries in the first half, came within inches of scoring two others in the second half, and we absolutely keeled over in our goal line defence 3 times in the first half. We played abhorrently but our absolute inability to ice key plays hurt us. We are just lacking punch in the middle currently.
And for the record, anyone who still doesn’t think we miss SJ is kidding themselves.